Scientifically driven ethically planned humanely performed

Ari Broad-Wildes has been conducting biochemistry research for the past seven years at various prestigious universities including two Ivy League institutions, Cornell University and Harvard University.

While Ari's research is in understanding the structures of various types of proteins, her research background has honed her most important skill as a scientist, critical thinking. With her sharp critical thinking skills, Ari is able to adapt her scientific thinking to various different fields outside of her direct field of study, including the field of veterinary behavioral and physiological medicine. 

Ari's experience in research in conjunction with her experiences as a veterinary assistant with Louie's Legacy Animal Rescue ("LLAR") and a veterinary compounding pharmacy technician at MixLab Rx., Inc., she has a unique set of skills to develop a new kind of therapy for dogs. 

All behavioral treatments administered at WDD have been rigorously studied, and proven excellent results in sustainable, long-term behavioral changes. Established in 2021, WDD has accumulated a significant number of participants in our behavioral rehabilitation program to now see long-term, sustainable results in behavioral changes of regular daycare and/or boarding clients. 

After seeing the success of the positive reinforcement method in obedience training clients, and Ari piloting her positive reinforcement grooming therapy on her own pup Titan for the past five years, she decided to design and execute her novel grooming therapy based on touch, sensory, and treat incentivized therapy. 

In the late 1970s, Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT) was developed for persons diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder.  The fundamentals of DBT are acceptance and change. Through either accepting/changing aspects in your life through neurological rewiring methods, patients experienced a significant relief of emotional suffering. 

Ari's new behavioral therapy for canines coined, canine Sensory Behavioral Therapy (cSBT), exploits rewiring neurological connections and associations by introducing positive sensory input during typically stressful activities (i.e., grooming). Overtime, positive sensory input therapy results in dogs being relieved of their emotional suffering (anxieties) regarding their fear or trigger (i.e., grooming, parents leaving). Ari's pilot program has already experienced great success. She hopes to collaborate with a canine behavior lab at Cornell University to publish her research conducted at WDD. 

In designing cSBT, Ari had three main fundamentals to center around her therapy: 

1. Positive sensory input
2. Uncomfortable/negative activity exposure
3. Sensory-based positive response from trainer 

With these three things in mind, the most important aspect was maintaining the highest ethical standard in each one of these fundamental steps to cSBT: 

1. Only utilize safe objects as a positive sensory input 
2. Incrementally expose the dog to a negatively perceived activity to avoid traumatization 
3. Constant sensory-based positive affirmation (pets, hands on dog) and maintaining trainer focus relieves emotional suffering during negatively perceived activities  

Dog-dog positive interaction is also a key component to cSBT. Dogs are naturally pack animals, and rely on one another when one is not feeling well, example the picture to the right. Other dogs are a significant sensory input for dogs. Ensuring all interactions are positive is key to relieving emotional suffering for dogs with severe social anxiety. An ethical muzzle, which is breathable, eatable, and drinkable, may be worn for brief periods at a time to allow more socially aggressive dogs to have positive, independent social interactions with other dogs. The ethical muzzle not only prevents the dog from biting, preventing a dog fight, but it reminds them to communicate with other dogs by other means than their mouth, which is an act of dominance. For dogs with severe aggression tendencies, ethically muzzled social interactions are brief, and they are kept separated from the other dogs while unmuzzled until the dog has become incrementally exposed to no longer require the ethical muzzle for positive social interactions.   

In designing what hands on grooming-centered cSBT would look like, Ari kept three things in mind: 

1. Keep your hands on the dog at all times 
2. Keep the dog's mind occupied at all times 
3. Observe for exhaustion signs to know when to take breaks

Ari knew that to keep the dog's mind constantly occupied, constant sensory input would be required. This can be in the form of keeping the trainer's/groomer's hands on the dog at all times, to treat incentivization, puzzle toy pre-occupation, and constant talking to the dog to hold their attention. 

An example of humane performance of ethically planned techniques is displayed in the picture to the right, you can see Ari's mouth is open. She is holding Benji (pictured) in her lap to maintain constant physical touch to the dog. She is maintaining eye contact and directly talking to Benji to keep his mind occupied and maintain his attention on Ari, instead of the unpleasant blow dryer. By maintaining constant physical and eye contact with Benji, she is able to observe when his attention span is wearing thin and the anxieties regarding the unpleasant activity are kicking in. This is when the trainer/groomer would stop the unpleasant activity, give the dog a play break, and resume the unpleasant activity in approximately 30 minutes.